Short, Squat, and Hale

[symphonicpoet]

My third "army" is about a platoon's worth of squats. They constitute one small unit, elements of a second, a band of pirates and a few adventurers. I nicknamed the Army unit the "Flaming Fifth" with elements of the "Screwball Second" in support. This is, in many ways, my first mature work. You can see a shot of the whole gang together over on the Army Shots thread. They also appeared in a post of about a year ago called Not Quite Human that detailed several of my "abhuman" miniatures. It included a photo essay depicting a Squat reconnaissance of an alien site on a faraway planet. With apologies, I will repost the photos here. To make it more interesting, I'll also include a little color prose.

Far off, on the planet Moab III, PFC Bush of the Twelfth Logansport Guard Regiment, Imperial Army finds herself lost among the ruins of an alien civilization.

As the sun sets, she has learned nothing of her whereabouts. She transmits a distress call on an open channel. The renowned explorer, entrepreneur, and space-captain Goldberg Street isolates her signal and lands planetside.

Finding nothing be empty domes and dust, Goldberg Street fires off a report to his Marque Holder and Guildmaster, Bogino Ganbaatar on Burkhan Kaldun Prime. Ganbaaatar dispatches a team of his best Xenologists to investigate further.

From them, he learns that the site is a lost Eldar settlement, likely rich in treasure and archeotech. Ganbaatar immediately assembles an armed expedition to secure the area for further exploitation. He leads the party himself aboard his flagship BKMS Chingis Khagan.

Elements of the fifth platoon fan out through the vast, empty plaza.

In their wake, Ganbaatar descends to the planet to see with his own eyes what his privateer Goldberg Street has discovered.

In support light artillery from both fifth and second platoons sets up in the plaza.

Once the site is completely secure Burkhan Kaldun's Archmechan and his personal guard arrive, so that the prelate might lend his considerable talents and insure the proper treatment of this strange and dangerous site.

The dwarves do not learn the fate of PFC Bush. No trace of her is ever found in the village, but the Burkhan Kaldun Guild decide to establish a permanent outpost on the strange desert world, joining human miners surrounding the principal settlement at Logansport, semi-nomadic orkish bands in the desert, and various desperates wishing to remain distant from the Human Imperium and its harsh and arbitrary justice. With the dwarven arrival Moab III, though remote and quite sparsely populated, becomes one of the most diverse and sought after planets of the Tartarus rim.

 

[archaeopteryx]

Hey there, I really dig your style. The lamps? are unusual and inspired scenery items.

 

[Count Von Bruno]

I love them Poet, do I spot a Scrunt (or two) in there too?

Full marks for the conversions and managing to arm the little gits with power axes etc and not making them look ridiculous...I am also jealous of your tarantula

 

[symphonicpoet]

^Count von Bruno

No scrunts yet. The dwarves are all Citadel/Ironclaw Squats, every one. There is also the Imperial Guardswoman PFC Bush. (They may have still been "Army" at the time. I'm using that for my fluff, in any case.) Apart from that it's plastic squats, classic Bob Olley lead, a few Ratling Snipers, and the Adeptus Mechanicus. The hardest acquisition among my artillery was the Mole Mortar, actually. The rest of the arty I bought far earlier, ere the squats were banished. I'm truly deeply glad I clung to it. At one time I'd gone through a phase of actually thinning oddities out of my collection. I've mostly undone that, as I knew where they went, but man was I crazy then. (It was the late eighties. Thought this stuff would last forever.) What would you say if I said I still have a mint trike with ancestor sidecar waiting to be painted? The blister finally gave up the ghost and peeled open, but I've got it and it's fairly clear the glue just turned to dust. Want more exo-armor though.

Also, believe it or not this is probably my least converted army. That said, thank you. Finding arms for the pirates when I had nothing but box set squats and human arms to work with was . . . a challenge. There's some Necromunda in there. Some Guard. Don't even quite recall what all. Some putty. (No green stuff yet. That came later.) A little of this and a little of that. I've always been worried the axe was WAY to big, but I needed something to relieve the monotony, and they are dwarves.

Thank you Herr von Bruno. Vielen Dank. Meine Zwergen sind mein lieblings Wehr. Sie sind mein Kinder.

^archoepteryx

I've loved the glass lamp globes since I was a little kid. I still have the pole lame they theoretically belong to in my workshop. It's in rough shape. But it's dropped enough pieces spilling enough glass around my home that I needed a better use. The brass ones were from a dead fixture I had to replace. The greenhouse was my inspirational moment. Fixed a porchlight for my mother and thought "Hey, sitting on the counter like that it looks like a greenhouse. You mind if I claim your dead light for parts, mom?" She liked the idea so much she stole a similar one from a friend and uses it under her christmas tree to cover a little ice-skating rink. (Won't discuss the logic in this.) After that lights just started looking . . . different. And the old knobby ones make FANTASTIC eldar structures. Or will, anyway, once I get done with them.

Again, thank you.

 

[Count Von Bruno]

Ah, I had thought that the pirate with the spiked helmet and greatcoat was a Scrunt
Ooh err, look forward to seeing the Ancestor sidecar painted.

By the way, I can't believe I never saw that that big mech from your Marine forces was an ED-209

 

[symphonicpoet]

I can see the resemblance. He's actually from the "uncatalogued pirates." The whole list is towards the bottom of the page on the Squat Collector's Guide over on Collecting Citadel Miniatures. Anyway, he's one of my favorites. I've named him Otto. (Might have been another famous "von" with that in his list of titles somewhere, though perhaps less famous than the more proletarian "van" that conquered the whole of the Western world during Napoleon's unsuccessful bid at same.)

 

[Count Von Bruno]

Yes, aren't those Pirates awesome?

I only have one of them, the one to "Otto's" right- with the Middle Eastern style head dress and hook arm thing, though I have all but one of the Adventurers.
The Pirates and Adventurers are so cool!

 

[symphonicpoet]

I have six of the ten pirates, but only one of the adventurers: the fellow with the conical hat and the weird eyepiece. Indeed, the squat pirates are particularly special miniatures. I had a particularly frustrating painting accident with several of them (and several other high effort miniatures besides) that was, fortunately, mostly corrected. I made the mistake of spraying them with a matte lacquer on a wet day and the lacquer fogged with trapped condensate. I was furious with myself. I waited perhaps a week or two, hoping the lacquer would dry clear. When it did not I dumped them into the pine-sol bath overnight. The next day, when I withdrew them getting ready to strip I found that the fog had cleared. Evidently, the pine-sol removed the surface of the lacquer, but it never really removes the paint, only loosens it. Sensing an opportunity, I rinsed them very gently but quite thoroughly, let them dry again, and then lacquered them. The lacquer looks a bit thick and a bit off on several of them, but it is clear and they look acceptable. It was a fairly solid week's worth of painting I'd lost, so I'll take it and thank my fortune for now. Maybe I'll restrip and start over later.